The Golden Calf

The Israelites demanded that Aaron make them an idol, a golden calf, in rebellion against the will of God, during the forty days that Moses was absent.
Moses had climbed up Mt. Sinai to speak with God. There he received the two tablets of stone on which God wrote the Ten Commandments.

God had said, "Do not make molten idols."

But, in Egypt people had made molten idols to worship as their gods, so the people of Israel asked Aaron to make a similar one for them.

They threw all their gold into the fire and Aaron fashioned a golden calf for them, saying, that was the god who had delivered them from slavery, out of Egypt.
What a lie!

Background Reading:

The Golden Calf

32When the people saw that Moses was so
long in coming down from the mountain, they gathered around Aaron and
said, "Come, make us gods who will go before us. As for this fellow
Moses who brought us up out of Egypt, we don't know what has happened to
him."

2 Aaron answered them, "Take off the gold earrings that
your wives, your sons and your daughters are wearing, and bring them to
me." 3 So all the people took off their earrings and
brought them to Aaron. 4 He took what they handed him and
made it into an idol cast in the shape of a calf, fashioning it with a
tool. Then they said, "These are your gods, O Israel, who brought you up
out of Egypt."

5 When Aaron saw this, he built an altar in front of the
calf and announced, "Tomorrow there will be a festival to the LORD."6So
the next day the people rose early and sacrificed burnt offerings and
presented fellowship offerings. Afterward they sat down to eat and drink
and got up to indulge in revelry.

7 Then the LORD said to Moses, "Go down, because your
people, whom you brought up out of Egypt, have become corrupt. 8They
have been quick to turn away from what I commanded them and have made
themselves an idol cast in the shape of a calf. They have bowed down to
it and sacrificed to it and have said, ‘These are your gods, O Israel,
who brought you up out of Egypt.'

9 "I have seen these people," the LORD said to Moses,
"and they are a stiff-necked people. 10 Now leave me alone
so that my anger may burn against them and that I may destroy them. Then
I will make you into a great nation."

11 But Moses sought the favor of the LORD his God. "O
LORD," he said, "why should your anger burn against your people, whom
you brought out of Egypt with great power and a mighty hand? 12Why
should the Egyptians say, ‘It was with evil intent that he brought them
out, to kill them in the mountains and to wipe them off the face of the
earth'? Turn from your fierce anger; relent and do not bring disaster on
your people.13 Remember your servants Abraham, Isaac and
Israel, to whom you swore by your own self: ‘I will make your
descendants as numerous as the stars in the sky and I will give your
descendants all this land I promised them, and it will be their
inheritance forever.'" 14 Then the LORD relented and did
not bring on his people the disaster he had threatened.

15 Moses turned and went down the mountain
with the two tablets of the Testimony in his hands. They were inscribed
on both sides, front and back. 16 The tablets were the work
of God; the writing was the writing of God, engraved on the tablets.

17 When Joshua heard the noise of the people
shouting, he said to Moses, "There is the sound of war in the camp."

18 Moses replied:

"It is not the sound of victory,

it is not the sound of defeat;

it is the sound of singing that I hear."

19 When Moses approached the camp and saw the calf and
the dancing, his anger burned and he threw the tablets out of his hands,
breaking them to pieces at the foot of the mountain. 20 And
he took the calf they had made and burned it in the fire; then he
ground it to powder, scattered it on the water and made the Israelites
drink it.

21 He said to Aaron, "What did these people
do to you, that you led them into such great sin?"

22 "Do not be angry, my lord," Aaron answered. "You know
how prone these people are to evil. 23 They said to me,
‘Make us gods who will go before us. As for this fellow Moses who
brought us up out of Egypt, we don't know what has happened to him' 24So
I told them, —Whoever has any gold jewelry, take it off.' Then they
gave me the gold, and I threw it into the fire, and out came this calf!"

25 Moses saw that the people were running wild and that
Aaron had let them get out of control and so become a laughingstock to
their enemies. 26 So he stood at the entrance to the camp
and said, "Whoever is for the LORD, come to me." And all the Levites
rallied to him.

27 Then he said to them, "This is what the LORD, the God
of Israel, says: ‘Each man strap a sword to his side. Go back and forth
through the camp from one end to the other, each killing his brother and
friend and neighbor.'" 28 The Levites did as Moses
commanded, and that day about three thousand of the people died. 29Then
Moses said, "You have been set apart to the LORD today, for you were
against your own sons and brothers, and he has blessed you this day."

30 The next day Moses said to the people, "You have
committed a great sin. But now I will go up to the LORD; perhaps I can
make atonement for your sin."

31 So Moses went back to the LORD and said, "Oh, what a
great sin these people have committed! They have made themselves gods of
gold.32 But now, please forgive their sin—but if not, then
blot me out of the book you have written."

33 The LORD replied to Moses, "Whoever has
sinned against me I will blot out of my book. 34 Now go,
lead the people to the place I spoke of, and my angel will go before
you. However, when the time comes for me to punish, I will punish them
for their sin."

35 And the LORD struck the people with a plague because
of what they did with the calf Aaron had made.